D60 Truss

[AwesomeJ10]

Well the J10 Honcho has a broken/bent front axle. I think the tubes bent right where they go into the diff cause it's leaking right there.

I have another GM D60 sitting here in the garage and the plan is to rebuild the king pins and swap over the detroit/gears from the bent axle.

The problem is that I don't want to bend another D60. So I need a truss.

Anyone have any pics of a truss on a leaf sprung FSJ?

[Blazer3664]

I'll be keeping an eye on this one. Been thinking about it myself.

Jim

[csuengr]

It's not on a FSJ, but a leaf sprung Ford, according to the thread.



It looks that for a truss with leaf springs, the truss needs to be underneath.

Before you delve into this, might want to make sure the tube is actually bent. If it really is, that's impressive.

[AwesomeJ10]

How do you tell if the axle/inner c's/knuckles are bent?

[Stuka]

An alignment machine will give you a good idea provided the ball joints are in good shape.


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[csuengr]

If you gut the axle, you can, sometimes, look in one end through the axle and see it's bent.

[tgreese]

That's surprising that you would bend a front axle. As I recall, the typical failure is breaking the housing where the tube goes in. This was on baja cars that saw a lot of air time. Are you launching your truck ever?

The race cars would get the plug welds rewelded, and weld completely around the housing where the tubes go in. Early cars got a truss underneath, on the long side, but later cars got only extra weld (after Jeep strengthened the axle tubes). Only the long side is vulnerable. The bar on the bottom is more effective than a bar n the top (since it is in tension), but I expect a bar on top would work too, esp. if the web between the axle and the bar were filled in.

[Stuka]

That's surprising that you would bend a front axle. As I recall, the typical failure is breaking the housing where the tube goes in. This was on baja cars that saw a lot of air time. Are you launching your truck ever?

Lol, you could say that!


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[AwesomeJ10]

yeah so long story short.... the GM D60 king pin front axle has been abused.

I've recently replaced all of the TRE's and the steering links and set the toe-in to 1/4". The passenger front tire definitely has MUCH more camber than the driver side.

The king pin bearings are 4 years old and seem to be tight although I haven't taken them apart yet. The inner C's and knuckles look fine. Something is definitely bent *somewhere*, but I can't seem to find it. The truck drives fine and I 'wheeled it last weekend.